There’s been some recent speculation that the NFL’s Seattle Seahawks and NBA’s Portland Trail Blazers could be put up for sale at some point soon.
Current owner Jody Allen took control of the two franchises when her brother, Paul Allen, passed away at the age of 65 back in 2018. Prior to that, Allen had not been directly involved in the day-to-day operations of the two organizations — leading to speculation that she could look to sell.
That doesn’t seem to be the case. Allen released a statement on Tuesday indicating that there’s no immediate plans to sell the teams. There’s also no timeline for a potential sale.
“As we’ve stated before, neither of the teams is for sale and there are no sales discussions happening. A time will come when that changes given Paul’s plans to dedicate the vast majority of his wealth to philanthropy, but estates of this size and complexity can take 10 to 20 yar to wind down. There is no pre-ordained timeline by which the teams must be sold.”
Jody Allen statement on the Seattle Seahawks, Portland Trail Blazers
At the time of his death, Paul Allen was the 44th-wealthiest person in the world with a net worth of $20.3 billion. As his sister stated in the aforementioned press release, Allen’s goal has been to donate a vast majority of his wealth to charity.
Selling the Seattle Seahawks would go a long way in meeting that goal given that the Denver Broncos just sold for $4.65 billion. But this doesn’t seem to be in the cards.
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Seattle Seahawks franchise value and interested parties
We know Nike’s Phil Knight showed interest in buying the Blazers. That’s obviously not going to be part of the equation moving forward.
According to Forbes, the Seahawks are worth an estimated $3.5 billion in cold hard cash. The Broncos were at $3.75 billion before being sold. That gives us a reasonable window into what a sale might look like.
A Seattle native, Microsoft’s Bill Gates would make sense as a potential buyer. He has a net worth of north of $120 billion and ties to the Pacific Northwest. MacKenzie Scott, the ex-wife of Jeff Bezos, is someone else who has been bandied about as a potential NFL owner. Perhaps, that would sit well with Allen given Scott’s philanthropy.
Either way, it’s not looking like the Seattle Seahawks are going to be sold any time soon. At the very least, it’s not imminent.
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